A. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a feeding process and, more particularly, to a system and method for improving the feeding of cattle to provide improved meat quality, processing times, and use of standardized case-ready packaging.
B. Description of the Related Art
Traditional cattle feeding processing primarily utilized grass grazing sometimes in combination with corn, grain, hay, supplement and various bi-products, such as brewers grain, oat hull, wheat mids or any combination of such feed products. The cattle were born and left with their mothers to graze on grass until they reached approximately 500–700 pounds. They were then transferred to a finish feed lot and fattened to a slaughter weight of between 1100–1500 pounds, depending upon the cattle type. At the feed lot or before leaving the grass, the cattle were typically implanted with hormones to, for example, accelerate the growth process. The cattle were implanted three or four times prior to slaughter.
The muscle tissue of grass-fed animals is generally courser and undesirable to eat because the meat from the carcasses of such animals is tougher and considered by some people to be “stringy.” In contrast, animals fed on grain at a feed lot were generally more desirable to eat, although the hormones and some grass-fed toughness in the meat remained. Thus, while the hormones accelerated the animal's growth, it negatively affected the animal's meat texture.
Another problem with this traditional cattle feeding process is that it took approximately 18–24 months to get a calf from birth to slaughter.
Another problem with the cattle feeding processes of the past is that the feed oftentimes had undesirable bacteria, such as salmonella and other toxins. During the slaughter process, the organs of the animal sometimes became punctured, which resulted in the salmonella or toxins getting onto the meat that was ultimately butchered and consumed by a consumer. In order to kill these germs and sanitize the meat, packers used a sterilizing spray liquid which was sprayed directly onto the meat. The spray liquid may be undesirable because it adversely affected the taste of the meat and also added to the cost of the overall process.
Still another problem with the systems and methods of the past is that a typical animal was picked to go to slaughter from the degree of fat in the animal and number of days that the animal was on a grain ration. In the past, this typically ranged from 120–200 days, depending on the rations fed to the animal, whether the animal was being grazed on grass and the like. Consequently, the animals were often different sizes at the time they were slaughtered. Because the carcasses were of different sizes, it was difficult to provide any standard packaging in which the meat from the carcasses could be placed because the meat cuts were different sizes.
What is needed, therefore, is a system and method for reducing the birth-to-slaughter time period, while improving the meat quality, the time required to raise the animals from birth to slaughter, and the use of standardized packaging.